


Something to Believe In

by lovelyavengers (fandomsandxfiles)



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: F/M, Fluff, Mild Hurt/Comfort, Mutual Pining
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-26
Updated: 2021-02-26
Packaged: 2021-03-16 21:09:36
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,434
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29706621
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fandomsandxfiles/pseuds/lovelyavengers
Summary: You and Bucky are dancing around the truth, and neither of you want to be the first to admit it. But when Bucky get shot on a mission, you finally come clean.
Relationships: James "Bucky" Barnes/Reader
Kudos: 36





	Something to Believe In

**Author's Note:**

> hi! i'm testing a new psued for my marvel works :) if you're subscribed to me, you don't have to change anything on your end, you should still get notified under this name too

“Hey, Barnes!” Sam’s voice cut through Bucky’s daydream. “Pay attention!”

“What are you, my mother?” Bucky shot back, raising his eyebrows. They were currently sitting at a team briefing and Steve was standing in the front of the room, droning on and on about things Bucky couldn’t be bothered to care about. Steve may be his best friend, but that didn’t mean he was willing to listen to him talk about protocol and other bureaucratic garbage all day.

“Buck, what’s the problem?” he heard Steve say, and that’s when he realized that everyone in the meeting room was staring at him, including you. He was actually thinking about you, but he wasn’t about to admit to that.

“Yeah,” he said quickly, looking around at the rest of the team. “I’m fine, I’m just tired.” Steve went back to whatever he was talking about, but Bucky still wasn’t paying attention. He was still thinking of you.

You were Tony’s assistant, but you were also technically employed by the Avengers, so you had become a permanent fixture in the compound since he had arrived. It wasn’t uncommon to see you in the hallways or common areas, clipboard in hand, doing random tasks or running errands back and forth. You were friendly with everyone on the team too, and that meant that you were invited to movie nights, team dinners, and fancy events. And Bucky was enamored with you.

You were one of the nicest people he’d ever met. You weren’t afraid of him despite knowing everything about his past, and you treated him exactly like every other member of the team. Which was something that Bucky noticed more often than not. Look, he understood his past, and he appreciated people who tried to treat him with respect despite what he had done, but it was also painfully obvious when people feared him. It drew him closer to himself, if he was being honest, because it made him feel like he didn’t deserve to be at the compound.

Steve had to do a lot of arguing to get him on the team, because Tony was adamantly against it. He eventually caved, but it was clear that he wasn’t happy about it. Tony was never in the same room as Bucky unless he absolutely had to be, which Bucky understood. He didn’t want to be reminded of the sins of his past every time he walked into a room, but unfortunately for him there was no way to turn it off.

You were different though. He fell in love with you because you made him smile, because you treated him like you didn’t know what he did before he became an Avenger. You spent time with him, taught him how to use the coffee machine and other fancy kitchen appliances he didn’t understand, and smiled at him when you passed him in the halls and you were too busy to stop and chat. You were beautiful too, and Bucky fell more in love every time he looked into your eyes.

The meeting ended about 20 minutes later, but Bucky only realized it was over because of the commotion around him when everyone got up. He was still lost in thought.

***

You were watching Bucky through the meeting, only half-listening to what Steve had to say about team image and public relations. None of what he said really affected you that much, but you still sat in on a bunch of meetings like that to take notes and offer any possible suggestions. Half of you didn’t really mind though, because it meant you got to spend more time around Bucky.

You had a busy schedule, but you tried your best to see him as often as you could. You were friends, you told yourself, even if you weren’t really sure how he felt about you. Bucky was hard to read sometimes, but he was fun to hang around, and you enjoyed showing him all the joys of the 21st century. He was a quick learner, even if he had a little bit of trouble with the standard-issue smartphone he was given when he first got to the compound. And even once he figured out how to use it, he almost never had his phone on him, because he always left it in his room, so when you’d try to get a hold of him but you couldn’t, you were reduced to walking quickly through the compound and calling his name, hoping that you’d just happened across each other.

_“Bucky, I’ve been calling you for an hour,” you told him one of the first times it had happened. “Why weren’t you answering your phone?”_

_“I don’t have my phone,” he said, a confused look on his face. “Why would I need it?”_

_“So I can get a hold of you in an emergency,” you said. “And I don’t have to run through the compound like a chicken without a head.”_

You spent more time with Bucky Barnes than you did most of the other avengers, the one exception being Tony, because you mainly worked for him. And after a while, you found yourself falling in love with the stoic soldier. You would sneak glances at him during meetings and admire him from afar. You hoped that he liked you at least as a friend, and you didn’t ever want to admit to your other feelings unless he said something first. You didn’t want to make him uncomfortable, and you didn’t want him to think he had to return your affections. If he was happy, that was all that mattered.

***

Bucky liked you, but he didn’t want to admit it. You liked Bucky, but you were too scared to tell him how you felt. And Steve was tired of all the oblivious behavior.

He was friendly enough with you that you would occasionally go to lunch together, and he first noticed something when you had offhandedly asked how Bucky was doing a few months after he first arrived at the compound. You also seemed to pay more attention when Bucky was the topic of conversation. He had hinted to the fact that he knew you liked him once or twice, but every time you denied it.

But Steve finally figured out how he could get two of his friends to admit their feelings for one another, and it was something he could have never seen coming. They had just gotten back from a mission, and during that mission, Bucky had taken a bullet to his shoulder (because him and Sam were arguing about who-knows-what during the mission), and he was now in the medbay getting stitched up, even though he insisted that he didn’t need it and he would heal in a few hours. Steve practically had to lock him in to get him to just sit back and let someone else help him, but Bucky finally agreed to just rest.

Steve ran into you in the hallways of the compound, and you looked a little worried. “Is everyone back from the mission?” you asked.

“Yeah,” Steve said. “I just left Bucky in the medbay, and-”

“Bucky’s in the medbay?” you said, cutting Steve off. “Is he okay?”

“Yeah, he just got shot-” but Steve didn’t even get to finish his sentence and reassure you, because you had already disappeared from sight.

***

You burst into the room and immediately made your way over to Bucky, who was sitting on one of the observation tables and looked surprised to see you. “Y/N, what are you doing here?”

“Steve-” you said, slightly out of breath. “He said you were shot.”

“I’m fine Y/N, the bullet just grazed my shoulder,” he assured you.

“Are you sure you’re okay?” you asked worriedly. “You got shot, and-”

“Y/N,” Bucky said, reaching out and taking your hand as got down from the table. “I’m fine, I promise.”

“You better not be lying to me Barnes, because I care about you too much to lose you right now.” The words just slipped out of your mouth, and your eyes widened when you realized what you had just said. Barely thinking, you started to just back away from Bucky and leave the medbay.

You only stopped when you heard him say your name. “You care about me?” he asked as he walked over to you.

“Yeah,” you answered quietly. “I didn’t mean it to come out like that and-”

“Y/N, I mean this in the nicest way possible, but just shut up and kiss me already.”

You didn’t have to be told twice.

_\- the end -_


End file.
